On practicing what I preach

Soooo…apparently I’m *really* good at doling out advice and chatting up words of wisdom with ya’ll but the real question is:

Do I practice what I preach??

I give myself a “hell yeah!” on that one, and here’s why…

…last week I talked about my love/hate relationship with the dreadmill. You all offered up some awesome advice — and made me feel much better about not being the only one who has a hard time staying on the treadmill longer than a couple of miles.

So guess what I did the very next morning? I faced that dreadmill vs. going for a run outdoors (which I totally could have done that morning, too). And I managed 6.4 miles in just about an hour. On the dreadmill.

Amazing, right? Wellll…kinda.

Two things that worked for me and got me over that 6.0 mile hump:
– I tweeted out my intentions the night prior. Holy motivation and accountability! Whenever I wanted to hop off the treadmill early the next morning, I thought back to that tweet and soldiered on. Call it pride. Call it stubborness. Call it accountability. Whatever. It totally kept me moving, no matter how much I wanted to call it quits early.

– I found a TV show on-demand that I hadn’t watched in awhile and figured it would keep me good and preoccupied for the hour. Totally worked. I got caught up in the storyline and it was enough distraction to keep me chugging along (that and once I got over the 3 mile hump, it somehow felt less painful as the miles started to tick by, oddly enough).  And believe it or not, the longer I stuck to the miles, the quicker my pace – by the end of that hour, I was running in the 7.0- 7.5 range, with a final kick of 8.5!

…I mentioned staying “there” in the final mile or two of each run, focusing on pushing hard, staying in the moment versus letting my mind wander. On Sunday, I put that one to the test as well. My legs were kind of unhappy with me after Saturday’s 8-miler so we went with an old familiar 4.5 mile loop of ours. It was a gorgeous Sunday morning, nice fall feel to the air, ideal for running. My legs got me through the first 4 miles and I was about ready to phone it in for that last .5 mile. But I thought of that post, and my husband’s advice to stay ‘there” and I focused as hard as I could that final half mile. ANd I pushed it. Wicked hahd. Kinda felt like I wanted to puke near the end. Mission: accomplished. 

So yeah…I ‘spose I do practice what I preach, huh? Who knew?! 😉

And on that note, cheers to what I’m hoping will be a fantastic week, filled with awesome running weather, lots of barre n9ne and maybe, just maybe, a surprise visit to Core Fusion (more on this later).  A fun, fitness filled week…I’ll throw that on my “to enjoy” list for the week. How ’bout you?